Sports

[Pretentious]

Just out of curiosity, how much of a following to the big American sports (football and basketball mainly, I know baseball's big in Japan) have over in Japan? And likewise, do they follow the NFL, NBA, and MLB to any extent (no matter how minor/insignificant)?

I'm not much of a sports fan myself but for some reason, this is a question that's been nagging the back of my brain for awhile now.

[Azrael]

American sports are big...so long as there's a Japanese player involved.

The sports reports have daily "Japanese Baseball Player" updates, in which they report on how Ichiro/Matsui/whoever are doing. But they only tell you about that player. For example, they'll report that Matsui had three base hits and batted two runners in today, raising his average to .287 and his RBI total to 56. ...Meanwhile, the Yankees lost 21-4, but this appears as an unimportant piece of information onscreen and isn't talked about in the actual report.

Japanese coverage of last year's World Series: An after game-7 interview with the Cardinals Japanese pinch hitter - "Well, it was disappointing, but the Red Sox are a pretty good team." The end.

Otherwise, they could care less. NBA jerseys sell to the kids who want to wear them for hip-hop styles, but other than that, nothing. The NFL is non-existant here. You can catch NBA/NFL games on satellite TV...but nobody really cares.

[Turtle Stew]

What about NHL/Hockey? Oh, by the way. We get the NHL back this year! They already had drafts. On the 6th I think. Finally.

[Azrael]

They definitely don't care about the NHL/hockey.

[Mechs]

Actually I heard there are some Japanese football players in the European league. And they have a NFL Japan website thats in japanese so I think they might have some interest in football. BTW who saw the falcons and the colts play in tokyo on the 8th?

[kshgosu]

What about boxing? They do pretty well in the lighter divisions (strawweight etc). I heard the ladies are getting into k-1 stars.